Getting Design Approval: The Single Mockup Theory
Monday, May 26th, 2008For years, my employer has included this line in their standard contract: “We will propose 2-3 homepage mockups and a single secondary page mockup”.
There are variations on this throughout the industry, but overall it’s pretty standard, the assumption being that clients should see multiple concepts before choosing a direction for their website.
But it doesn’t often work.
Never having faced these kinds (or any kind) of design choices before, the client often takes the weakest elements of one mockup, suggests merging them with the weakest elements of the other mockup, and because they’re paying you big dollars, you’re expected to comply.
Now you’re both stuck. You’ve allowed them to settle on a mishmash Frankenstein product and bogged them down with a maze of choices rather than doing the right thing — using your expertise to steer them in the right direction.
What’s worse is that the endless back-and-forths with the client have wiped out your design budget. You’ve got zero remaining hours for your Frankenstein homepage and minimal hours left for designing important secondary page concepts like product listings or blog pages.
Reverse the Numbers
In the past year, I’ve pushed to change our standard contract to say, “We will propose 1 wireframe, 1 homepage mockup, and 2-3 secondary page mockups”. So far the result has been distinctly happier clients and happier designers.
Why? The underlying idea is that a design budget is better spent with ample planning, strategy and confidence applied to one “definitely” design, rather than letting clients chase after multiple “maybe” designs.
Meetings and Exploratory Time
Initial meet-and-greets are a great opportunity to squeeze the client for information on their tastes and their industry. If they’re overwhelmed or unable to offer useful information, it’s your job to get them in touch with their own opinions.
I’ve found it helpful to use a big-screen projector while browsing select sites from CSS Beauty or Most Inspired or Best Web Gallery. Try to gauge what ‘moods’ the client responds to, as they relate to specific colors, shapes, layouts and typography. It should become apparent what the client likes, and more importantly, doesn’t like. If they’re still indifferent, explain to them which sites work for you and be specific about why.
I also have clients bring in marketing materials like business cards, photos and brochures. Lay them out on the table and see what they do and don’t like about their existing business identity. If they absolutely need certain elements from their print materials to carry over to the website, discuss ways you can and can’t deviate.
We’ve now established some things about design aesthetics, but before the meeting is over, we also want to establish the content types that will display on the homepage: marketing text, taglines, blog excerpts, featured products, masthead imagery. Break them into modules and sketch it on paper if necessary, or use a tool like Best4C.
By now we have both ‘mood’ and modules established, which will make it easier to determine the sort of layout we’ll need: minimalist, blog style, magazine style, corporate, or otherwise. When the meeting is over, both designer and client should leave with a clear mental picture and be ready to set a single design strategy in motion.
Moodboards, Wireframes & Info Design
If the client is on a smaller budget, you may need to skip ahead to creating a polished homepage mockup. Otherwise, it’s good to use the post-meeting/pre-design phase for making preliminary sketches either in the form of wireframes or simple moodboards.
The ‘Polished’ Homepage Mockup
Once these general blueprints are client-approved, the table should be set for you to create a focused, polished mockup. I’ve found client approval to come more easily if the mockup is presented with thorough notes on why your design team felt it worked, was strong, and represented them well. As we are the appointed experts in this case, they are often willing to listen.
Why Multiple Secondary Mockups?
If the client’s site will have dynamic features like a shopping cart, for example, mocking up the interior product pages is going to be pivotal. Clients who barely care about the color scheme on their homepage will definitely, and loudly, have opinions on the user-experience of their store. Plus, you and your production team will need to know how static pages and sublevel navigation will look. If you already hit your single homepage concept out of the park, there should be plenty of budget left over for getting these interior pages on track and providing additional mid-phase information design.
Why additional information design? Because no matter how “100% sure” a client is about the content materials they provided upfront, trust they will ALWAYS need help re-organizing their content halfway through the build process, once they’ve seen it on the screen.
It’s our job to be patient throughout the strategy process — what’s second-nature to us is likely to be completely foreign to them. Ideally, we should know when to take charge and when to collaborate equally.
Related Quotes
This process of creating one mock up is really trying to get the message across that if you take more time accessing the clients needs with well planned data gathering / analysis you will get the mock up that’s a good fit for the company first time.
Many clients like the idea of having the option to choose between multiple design concepts. However, although on the surface this might appear to be a good idea it can ultimately be counterproductive for design sign off.
In a world of limited budgets it is unwise to waste money on producing designs that are ultimately going to be thrown away. The resources would be better spent refining a single design through multiple iterations.
What is more, multiple concepts often cause confusion rather than clarity. It is common for a client to request one element from one design and another from the second. As any designer knows this seldom works.
If you present clients with multiple ideas and expect them to choose one, invariably, the end result is muted and diluted as the message of the different ideas gets blended together. This is what happens when you approach the situation with an offering.
Instead of spending time creating 3 differnt comps, ideas, or concepts, take aim at that one that’s great and make it amazing. Blow them out of the water. Leave them speechless. That’s guiding.
It’s really about taking them where you feel and know they need to go. You may be a little off course and that is to be expected. Believe it or not, your clients are looking to you for answers, and they want to help you find those answers. They are looking to you for guidance to the best solution.
